Parenting Parker
by Sonic Serendipity
Summary: Four times it required the techniques of a mastermind (it's a very distinctive skillset) and once when it wasn't complicated at all.


"Now, Parker, you know that thing in the Met? How you stole a nearly worthless piece just to judge how security would react before you went for something actually tough? That's pretty much what you're doing now. Just giving him something and seeing how he reacts. You're doing great, keep working on the small talk."

He clicks off the transmission on their earbuds to reduce the distraction, and Sophie looks at him with narrowed eyes. "You never talked with Parker this much before, and it's working much better than when I last coached her through a grift. What's different?"

"Ah, well…" he looks pleased, in the self-satisfied way that is both supremely annoying and strangely attractive. "The problem was, you were treating her like a professional."

"Parker is a professional," she said. "And I hope that wasn't as sexist as it sounded."

"No, no, no, not at all." He leans forward and taps the desk meaningfully. "Parker is a professional, but a professional thief. Grifting, well, that's a whole 'nother animal—and as far as people skills go she's more like a kid than a hardened pro." He held up a hand to pause her, and dialed Parker on the cell. When she picked up, he talked her through extracting herself from the mark to 'answer an important call'. When she hung up, he returned his eyes to Sophie and shrugged. "The way you teach a kid and the way you teach an adult, a professional, they're different. A pro knows it's not personal, they can learn something that they don't like because they know it's important…and they aren't bothered by not knowing something."

"And a kid?"

He pressed his lips together, but couldn't hide the amusement in his eyes. "A kid takes it personal. You have to give it to them gradually, in steps, and let them come to certain realizations by themselves. A kid feels like he knows nothing about what you're trying to tell him, he gets embarrassed—and any good con knows that embarrassed people make mistakes."

"Nate," Parker hisses across the earbud. "What do I do? I'm supposed to watch him but staring at people creeps them out."

"That's true, Parker, good job remembering that." His voice over the comm must seem completely mild and professional to Parker, but Sophie can see his mouth curling up at the corners with a fondness he isn't able to repress any more. "How would you look at a painting you were casing? Since you need to look it over but people might get suspicious if you're staring at it."

"Don't look guilty," she says promptly. "Brief glances, casual, and if someone meets your eyes don't jerk your head away, either drop your eyes or give them a small smile."

"Good girl," he says, and the expression previously confined to his blue eyes has bled into his voice. "The mark is the same. He'll interpret any glances at him as you liking him but being shy, don't worry about it." He clicks off the comm. Once more, looking up and meeting Sophie's face. His expression belatedly smoothes out as he tries for neutrality again, and she laughs at him, very quietly. "What?"

"Nothing," she says. "Just learning from a professional."

* * *

"Can you go stand next to Parker and look sad?"

Maggie looks at her husband blankly, feeling about 5 steps behind him yet again. "I'm sorry?"

"Parker. She needs a hug."

She looks over at the pretty young thief, who is looking a bit nervous and anxious. "So why don't you hug her? She barely knows me."

"Well, yeah, but you don't hug Parker, you don't touch Parker: she has to initiate it."

"Which brings me back to my question; why me?"

He shrugs, scrubbing a hand through the dark curls she always loved. "She wouldn't with me, I'm the boss. But she thinks you're cute."

"Uh-huh." Maggie raises an eyebrow at him, amusement lurking at the corners of her mouth. "Just stand there and look kind of sad?"

"That should do it."

He's got his chessmaster face on, the one that's both much more and much less irritating because he usually was as right as he thought he was. But just because his plans are right doesn't mean they're ever PERFECT, and she carefully hugs him, letting her smile break out for just a moment as his arms hesitantly close over her shoulders as well. She pulls away, meeting his bemused eyes, and shrugs. "Just to plant the idea."

She goes to stand by Parker and look a little sad, and the girl's hug is kind of strangling and sharp-edged, but it's no chore. She looks over her shoulder at Nate, and sees something in his face that makes her breath catch in her throat, something soft that she thought had died with their son. Her arms tighten as she tucks her face against Parker's shoulder, and she hugs her as tightly as he might want to.

* * *

"How's she doing?"

Hardison looks up from his book (analogue, ick) in surprise at Nate's quiet voice. "Oh, hey, man. I thought you had some stuff to do for the client? Everyone else already came and went, she was asking for you."

"Nothing to do now." He moves closer, hesitantly, the way Nate only ever hesitated when faced with hurting kids or hospitals. "They gonna have to operate again?"

"Nah, man, they got everything." Hardison leans forward compulsively, sliding his hand through the tubes to lay his dark fingers over her chalk-white ones. "Lord knows we all private people, I don't go diggin' around in y'all's shit more than necessary, but I got what little there is in the way of medical history for her."

"What's your cover?"

Hardison shrugs a little, smiling crookedly. "Foster brother. Explains the different names, and, y'know. Sophie says next time she can be the girlfriend."

"That won't be necessary." Nate moves forward another step, jerkily, as if Parker had woken up and was reeling him in. (she would do it, too. Dumbest thing Eliot ever did was teaching that girl how to use a lasso) "All her identities, I want you listing me as next of kin."

"Oh. What, like, brother, father, what?" He starts running the ids over in his mind. "I know y'all have three or four ids with the same last name..."

"Adopted father, all IDs. Don't look like we're related, and besides, then they'd only ask about family medical history, and that..." he looks at the iv stand, his hand reaching out and resting lightly on Parker's foot. "That'd just...muddy the waters."

"Okay, yeah, no big. You want me to start now?" He gives her hand one last pat and pulls back to sit straight in the crappy folding chair. "Congratulations, it's a girl!"

Nate smiles, very small, while he gives the thief's foot the slightest squeeze. "No need, just...next time."

He leaves, walking quickly but with a backward glance at the still figure in the bed.

Hospitals and hurting kids, huh.

* * *

"Is there a reason you're cooking with a full pound of butter?"

The voice right over his shoulder might have startled another man, but it takes more than some baking to distract Eliot from tracking the positions of everyone in the room with him, and he merely rolls his eyes and lifts up the bowl where Nate can see it better. "For Parker. She doesn't eat worth crap, God knows where she gets the energy to do what she does when she hardly ever imbibes a thing aside from cereal."

"Uh-huh." Nate peers into the bowl, off-duty and just drunk enough to wobble a bit. "So the solution is...something even more unhealthy than frosted flakes?"

"Baby steps," Eliot says darkly. "I'm starting by slipping something a little more solid by, and hoping that eventually I might be able to sneak some vegetables into her."

Nate snickers faintly, then gestures with his head towards the main room. "C'mon, I'll show you something that might reassure you at least a little." Eliot puts down the bowl and follows as the older man's carefully straight steps. He stops by the little side-table with the green lamp on it (formerly a white lamp, replaced after the crayon incident) and pulls out the drawer. Rifling around in the small detritus within, he pulls out a gummy bear, a little dusty.

"Candy. So?"

"Ah, no, see," he lifts up the bear to the light and squints lovingly at it like it's a gem. "It's actually a gummy vitamin."

"Oh, yeah, those are pretty good. Easier to digest than the solid pills. So Parker eats those?"

"Not exactly." Nate returns the gelatinous ursine to the drawer and closes it with a gentle thump. "You give 'em to her—no dice. Won't touch 'em. But if you HIDE them..."

The light dawns. "Then she steals 'em."

"And eats them." Nate toasts him with his brandy and looks sardonically content. "Like pinching a toddler's nose shut when he won't open his mouth for medicine. Sometimes you gotta come at it sideways."

"Everything is sideways with Parker."

"True enough," Nate agrees, and wanders away towards the fridge again. "If a thing's worth doing it's worth doing sideways too."

* * *

"Guys? Guys can you hear, uh, me, us? I've got nothing on the earbud and no cell signal. Guys? I'm okay but Parker is gonna need an ambulance. Hardison? ...damn."

He stopped wasting breath on speaking, instead putting his shoulder under the fallen beam and shoving it over just a foot. "Parker? Parker, can you hear me?" She mumbled indistinctly, the hand that was all he could see of her twitching slightly. "Hold on, I've just gotta-" he adjusted his grip and grunted as he finally levered the beam far enough away to get at his thief. "Parker, you're under a pile of debris that's not very stable. Can you move? How's your head?"

Nate dropped to the ground and wriggled forward army-style to her precarious position. Her normally clear eyes were clouded and blood stained her hair at her temple. "My...uh...m'head? 'S..." she shook it slightly, eyes widening slightly at the jolt of pain. "Okay, ouch."

Half his attention on the surroundings, he reached out and tried to feel her head and neck. "Can you move? We should get you out if we..." she presented him with both her hands trustingly, and he swallowed as he grabbed those deceptively slender wrists. It took some doing, working himself backwards and trying to carefully pull Parker after him, but with a little help (even injured, she was amazingly flexible) they were both free of the worst of it. Once loose, he carefully picked her up and carried her over to the doorway that had given him more protection than her when the roof fell in on them.

"Are you okay?" she asked in a small cautious voice.

"What? Yeah, of course..."

Her fingers reached up to his forehead gently and, because this was Parker, prodded the cut there none too gently.

"Woah, hell, Parker!" Her hand drifted down and patted his cheek very sweetly, and he caught it, the familiar mix of fondness and exasperation she always caused making him roll his eyes. "What am I gonna do with you, huh."

"Hopefully save my life," she said woozily, letting her head thump against his shoulder. "Which, before, uh...thanks."

"Don't worry about it," he said quietly. "You want me to put you down? Not that the floor is all too clean right now."

"You're not too clean yourself." She sniffed him, which was pretty standard for Parker. "You smell like Nate but also like explosives and sweat."

"Sorry," he said, leaning back a little against the doorframe. She smiled up at him, cross-eyed with proximity.

"It's okay. I like Nate-smell." She tucked her face into his neck and hummed contentedly, and before he could stop himself his hand was cradling the back of her head.

"You're crazy, Parker," he whispered, and she nodded.

"You too. Eliot and Hardison and Sophie too. It's why y'like us," she said, voice fading even as she became more boneless in his arms. "We're your people."

"Yeah," he sighed, as she eased into sleep, muscle-memory taking over as he shifted his grip to tuck her more firmly against him. "Yeah, sweetheart, that you are."

The rescue crew stabilized the site and pulled them out an hour later, with the crew hovering obstructively nearby. Nate nodded at them, acknowledging the earbud Sophie slipped into his pocket when she patted his back; they all exchanged knowing looks as he insisted on sharing the ambulance with his 'adopted daughter' and he rolled his eyes at them as the door slammed shut.

One sleight-of-hand later the piece was in his ear, just in time to hear Hardison's strident voice saying, "-completely gone, man. Hooked. Besotted, even."

"Funny thing is how you guys think you know anything I don't," he said sotto voice, and the comm fell dead silent. "Don't worry, guys, I'll take care of her until you show up."

"Not your first rodeo, anyway," Eliot said. (it always amazed Nate how anyone could think Eliot was just dumb muscle)

"Didn't have a very good run last time," he murmured. The paramedics were running IVs and examining Parker's head wound, but there was space at the end of the gurney and he placed his hands on her feet to let her know he was there.

"Doesn't mean you can't do the job," Eliot replied just as softly. "And you got backup."

Nate sighed, then leaned over to grip the hand that Parker was stretching towards him. "He doesn't like hospitals," she was seriously telling the paramedics. "Why don't we just stay in here?"

He laughed, and stopped it before it turned to tears by firmly kissing the back of her hand. "It's okay, sweetheart," he said. "I've got backup."


End file.
